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Accordion virtuoso bound for
Buncrana
20.02.08
TG4's Young Traditional
Musician of the Year Martin Tourish is booked again
to play the Ar Ais Aris Festival in Buncrana.
The young piano accordion virtuoso, who is a cousin
of Altan’s Ciaran Tourish, started out as a student
of classical accordian at DIT’s Conservatory of
Music in Rathmines.
He’s as drawn to the tangos of Piazzola and the
Spanish rhythms of Galicia and Asturias as he is to
the slow airs of John Doherty or the strathspeys and
Highlands of Altan. |
Within the past year
also, Martin has fallen heir to a box of 18th
Century manuscripts of East Donegal music which have
been in the Tourish family since 1897. This has
added yet another dimension to his playing and to
his repertoire of tunes.
“Little is known about East Donegal music because
it’s long died out," |
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Martin explains. "We
know about South West Donegal, Kilcar, Teelin and
North Donegal thanks to fiddler Dinny McLaughlin and
I honestly didn’t realise that there was much music
here to begin with. But last year, my great great
granduncle, Barney Tourish, presented me with this
box of 400 tunes that have been in his attic since
the 1950s. I’ve found new forms of tunes, including
a huge collection of Northern polkas which have more
notes in them than the Southern kind which you find
in Sliabh Luachra," he added.
“It’s incredible; pre-Gaelic League, so it includes
tunes that predated a great clearing out of tunes
that were not deemed to be sufficiently 'Irish'.
Collections from that period were heavily edited to
correspond with the Gaelic League’s version of what
was authentic, because the new nation wanted to
create its own picture of what it was all about. So
this collection is fantastic and it's never been
published before,” he said.
For more information on the upcoming Ar Ais Aris
Festival, pick up a flyer, visit
www.buncranatradfest.com or call 086 882
9019. |
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